


off chance with a poster of a girl

by portions_forfox



Category: Skins (UK)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-25
Updated: 2012-06-25
Packaged: 2017-11-17 08:45:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/549715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/portions_forfox/pseuds/portions_forfox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jal always waits by the door for her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	off chance with a poster of a girl

**Author's Note:**

  * For [three_things_sid](https://archiveofourown.org/users/three_things_sid/gifts).



> written for [](http://lesoleilluna.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://lesoleilluna.livejournal.com/)**lesoleilluna** , whose prompt was _it's okay, you're home now_

It's not as though this story's any new.

Michelle calls Jal, crying, heaving, begging, and between the violent sniffling and the lurching sobs four words are always clear, _He did it again._

  
_Can I come ove_ r, Chel always pleads, like she even has to ask, like there's any chance that Jal will tell her no. But she asks anyway, because—it's funny, but the only time Chel really sees how shitty she treats Jal is when Tony breaks her heart.

Jal waits at the door, rain slating down against the dark-trimmed windows and blurring her view of the street. Her dad always does this thing when he sees her standing there, foot tapping anxiously and arms crossed, this thing where he opens his mouth like he's going to speak but then closes it again. Plods up the stairs to bed. He knows, by now. It's nearly rote.

Michelle's the type of girl who hides her tears, swallows them down her throat, salt, sweat. She's _composed_ , Michelle. So when she starts up the steps to Jal's house and Jal wrenches open the door and yanks her inside she's not crying anymore, unless you count the rain. Always the rain.

But her mother's warnings, _Class, Michelle—nice girls don't cry for the world to see_ , they don't apply to Jal. They don't apply to the soft linen sheets of Jal's bed, the round white bulge of Jal's pillow, the warmth and glow of Jal's bedroom. Michelle pulls the blanket up to her chin, unchipped blood red nails scraping her neck, and she cries.

  
_Sshh, sshh_ , Jal sings, fingers sifting through Chel's hair, and the rules don't apply with her head in Jal's lap, and the world is less fucked when she's there.

Michelle is winding down to sleep, slow sobs still shaking the lines of her bones, and Jal looks out the window to the falling rain. _She'll come back_ , Tony had said, and just like with everything else, he was always right.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

It's not as though this story's any new.

Jal waits by the door. Her father is silent for once. Nods to her. Heads up the stairs.

It's raining.

Chel drags her feet up the stairs, falls into bed. Watches the rain, and cries. She's not making sense—or at least, less sense than usual—and as Jal tugs her head into her lap she can hear, _It's different, it's different, it's different this time_ , like a song, like one of Anwar's prayers.

"Wha's that?" Jal asks her, and Michelle chokes out a sob.

"He came to my house," she tells Jal. "He stood at my door," she tells Jal. "He told me he loved me, and I said no."

  
_Good_ , Jal thinks, but there are too many reasons for the fleeting word, too many threads she can't take care to untangle. She's never been a patient one, Jal.

"Oh, Chel," she says instead.

"I miss him," Chel hums, and it rings more true than any of her other words, more true than _I love him_ , in fact.

"I know, I know you do," Jal murmurs. Runs a finger through a ringlet curl.

Chel shifts her head, nose pressing into Jal's stomach. "I'm a shit friend," she breathes, eyes wet. "I am."

Jal should probably say _You're not_ , because that's the type of thing she always says in these situations, but instead she finds a laugh bubbling up inside of her, absurd, unstoppable. "You kind of are," she agrees, and then the laugh cuts out between her teeth, and Michelle's shaking in her lap, a chuckle.

It dies away. The rain beats on against the window.

"I miss him" again.

"I know."

Michelle shifts.

Tilts her head away from Jal's stomach.

Eyes are pink, puffy, swollen.

She's still beautiful. It's not really fair.

"I want you," Chel says, "to kiss me," so Jal leans down and kisses her, lips chaste and closed against Chel's mouth. Her face is wet, from the rain, and from tears, and from lip gloss.

Jal pulls away.

"I miss him."

"I know."

"Kiss me again."

And this time there's Chel's jaw slanting open beneath the press of her lips, and the soft, wet inside of Chel's mouth, and Chel's tongue gliding lazily into the curve of Jal's cheek.

And Chel's hand snaking into the back of Jal's hair, and Chel's chest arching upward into Jal, an inhalation, and Chel's tiny, open moan—

( _We should stop_ , Jal thinks she ought to say, but it's different, it's different, it's different this time.)

Chel's fingers curling around the hem of Jal's shirt, and Chel's palms brushing Jal's ribs as she pulls the shirt up over her shoulders, and the heat of Chel's everything as she straddles Jal's hips.

And the pulse of Chel's finger inside of her, and the bite of Chel's words when she tells her _Come on, come for me Jal, just fucking come_ , and the sight of Jal's own hand pushing down in Chel's hair, and Chel bends at the touch, for once, for once.


End file.
